


Better

by Shipper_on_deck



Category: Newsies (1992), Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: Emotional Abuse, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, Implied/Referenced Abuse, M/M, Modern AU, Physical Abuse, Pining, Roommates, its 2am
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-25
Updated: 2019-06-25
Packaged: 2020-05-19 06:43:32
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19351588
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Shipper_on_deck/pseuds/Shipper_on_deck
Summary: Jack Kelly had been helplessly, irrevocably in love with Davey since their freshman year, and yet nothing spilled out until Davey’s boyfriend finally went too far.





	Better

At first, living together had been really, genuinely fun. Davey cleaned up without thinking, using it as a comping mechanism to calm down, and Jack was a damn good cook. They’d been as close as family all through high school, permanently joined at the hip. They had so much in common, and it had just made sense for them to find a place together when they both went on to college.

There was just one issue: Jack Kelly has met David Jacobs on his first day of freshman year, and had fallen helplessly, irrevocably in love with him by half way through. And that was ok, really it was! He could ignore the crush, pray it would fade so he didn’t lose his best friend. But it was alright!

That was, until bill happened.

Bill had been in Davey’s journalism lectures from the start of the year, and they’d talked from time to time, until Davey started developing a crush. And Jack was fine, he could cope with his jealousy... Davey was smiling, and happy, and frankly he deserved that much, even if he wasn’t the one putting that lovestruck smile on his face.

When they got together, of course the ache got worse, and now Jack had to contend with Davey missing some nights, having to cancel what had been their little rituals since they’d started living together for his boyfriend. And still, that was fine! He was still happy, he smiled and laughed, and his eyes twinkled whenever he was talking about Bill, and fine, Jack could cope with listening to his best friend talk about how /amazing/ his boyfriend was. He could swallow his jealousy for long enough to see Davey he as happy as he was.

Until suddenly, he wasn’t.

Jack honestly couldn’t say when it started, when he looked back. When Davey’s smiles had gone from blinding to dull to forced, when the look in his eyes at the mention of Bill’s name had gone from adoring and loving to almost fearful... when the hickies That forever seemed to be littering his neck were replaced with darker, more threatening bruises, but at some point it had happened. And Davey still /insisted/ he was happy! Insisted bill was a good man, and that they deserved each other, and once- in a time that truly made Jack’s stomach roll- he’d said he probably deserved it. 

But Jack hadn’t questioned it, had promised himself that if the bruises ever showed up again, that if Davey ever seemed genuine in danger (Davey had written the handprint off as something they’d tried in bed) he’d step in, and when that day finally came, /god/ had he snapped.

Jack had ended up grabbing a coffee with the two of them, since Davey still really wanted Jack to meet Bill, and while bill had been perfectly courteous, almost to the point of being robotic, with Jack, that same principal clearly didn’t extend to his boyfriend. Jack had started balling his hands into fists under the table at every awful, cruel, or derogatory joke Bill made about Davey, who always laughed along... but Jack knew him. Jack knew Davey in ways Bill never would, and he /knew/ that fake laugh, so fine! Maybe he’d snapped. Maybe he’d called bill out for what he was, a manipulative, lying, bastard of a man, and maybe it had started an argument- their /biggest/ argument- when Jack and Davey had gotten home. 

“I don’t understand why you’re being such an asshole about this!” Davey had snapped, eyes cold, as if he blamed Jack for being angry that that worthless /bastard/ was treating him like garbage.

“I’m not being an asshole! I’m being your friend!” Jack had snapped back, wound up and angry, and verging on doing something, he couldn’t tell what, but there was this feeling. This treacherous, bubbling feeling that gnawed furiously at his insides, threatening... something. “I just don’t think he deserves you!”

“Oh, So you get to decide who I date?” Davey had snapped back, angry, and hurt, and damnit there were tears in his eyes, and that just made the feeling worse. Davey didn’t deserve to be crying... he never deserved to be hurt like this, to have tears in those beautiful blue eyes. It wasn’t right!

“No! I’m not saying I do! I just think you deserve better than a bastard like him!” Jack snapped again, exasperated, and almost angry, and whatever that damn feeling was was just swelling now. Like it was filling him, like his chest was aching and burning with the force of this... /thing/. This great, pulsing feeling that he was on the edge of something that would change everything, but he couldn’t tell what that something was going to be.

“Why do you even care Jack!” The tears were falling now. They were yelling at each other in the middle of their apartment, and Davey was crying, and that feeling was swelling again, filling his chest and his stomach and his head until this dam broke and-

“Because I know I could be better!”

And that was all it took to make the room silent. The animosity between them ebbing away and leaving a cold, terrifying silence between them, and in the end, it was Jack- more exposed and vulnerable than he’d ever felt- that broke the silence.

“I-it’s just that... Davey I know how he treats you.” He said quietly. “Like you’re an object. Like you deserve to be used, and treat like you’re nothing, when in fact you’re... you’re incredible.” He wasn’t looking at Davey. He couldn’t bare to see the hurt, or this disgust, or the anger, or /whatever/ was written on his face now. “He looks at you like you’re a body, but he doesn’t even notice the little things about /that/... he doesn’t notice the way you scrunch your nose when you’re laughing, or the way your eyes sparkle when you’re smiling, because if he noticed he wouldn’t say half the shit he does. And he doesn’t notice the way you fiddle with the skin between your fingers when you’re anxious, because I’ve seen you do it around him, and He never even checks you’re ok! And that’s without mentioning your personality!” He couldn’t stop now. Once he’d started talking, it was like letting years of jealousy, and hurt, and longing flow out all at once. “He doesn’t seem to care that you’re so fiercely intelligent and passionate that you could easily be president someday. He doesn’t notice that you’ve got this huge. Almost naive heart that sees the best in everyone, and believes in second chances... he doesn’t see you as this amazing person, you’re just a /body/ to him, and it’s sick!” Jack finally made himself look up then, seeing the tears still falling from Davey’s eyes as he stumbled through “he doesn’t deserve you... and neither do I. But I could come a damn sight closer than he /ever/ could.”

Jack wasn’t even sure what happened next... just that one moment Davey was looking, gobsmacked, at him, and the next he had his arms full of his crying best friend, as a pair of soft, bitten lips pressed against his own.

“It’s ok, it’s ok, I’ve got you...” jack mumbled as they pulled apart, and Davey buried his face into Jack’s neck with a choked sob. there would be a bigger conversation tomorrow. About what they were, and how Davey should end things with Bill, but that could all wait.

What mattered now, was them. Was Jack, clutching Davey to his chest like he’d never, never let anyone hurt him again, and rocking them both gently. Like two puzzle pieces, finally clicking into place.


End file.
